Ripping off the taxpayer

Posted
Tuesday, May 27, 2014 1:00 pm

To the Editor:

The Beacon, during the week of April 6 through April 12, had an article on unfairness of levying fines on people who were late paying their taxes because two different groups were fined two different amounts for no apparent reason. Mr. Ed Ladouceur was objecting to the unfairness of the differences of how these fines were levied and how these fines should be made fair by being based on the same things. Same infraction, same fine.

Councilwoman Donna Travis’ concern, as stated in the Beacon, was how to make up the revenue lost from making the fines levied on property owners less draconian. Basically, she was asking how we should make up the money Warwick was not going to receive by continuing with the unfair tax collection policy fines. This article points out that Ms. Travis seems to be planning on the fine money for our budget. Aren’t fines supposed to keep people from doing the wrong thing? What if everyone pays his taxes on time? Does the Warwick city budget go down the drain?

This state is so badly run by so many people who have no desire to make R.I. run well and be a place people actually want to stay in that this kind of financial plan is how Warwick is run. Fines are windfalls, not money to be relied on. We should particularly not be reliant on unfair fines. Why doesn’t Ms. Travis know this? Should she be anywhere near our money? How about our car tax, which is based on cars we don’t own. If we straighten that out and actually are taxed on cars we do own, would you, Ms. Travis, be objecting on the basis of “how are we going to make up the difference in revenue?” The revenue received by ripping off the taxpayers?